rudimentary; and in some species of Viola three stamens are in this state,
two retaining their proper function, but being of very small size. In six
out of thirty of the closed flowers in an Indian violet (name unknown, for
the plants have never produced with me perfect flowers), the sepals are
reduced from the normal number of five to three. In one section of the
Malpighiaceae the closed flowers, according to A. de Jussieu, are still
further modified, for the five stamens which stand opposite to the sepals
are all aborted, a sixth stamen standing opposite to a petal being alone
developed; and this stamen is not present in the ordinary flowers of this
species; the style is aborted; and the ovaria are reduced from three to
two. Now although natural selection may well have had the power to prevent
some of the flowers from expanding, and to reduce the amount of pollen,
when rendered by the closure of the flowers superfluous, yet hardly any of
the above special modifications can have been thus determined, but must
have followed from the laws of growth, including the functional inactivity
of parts, during the progress of the reduction of the pollen and the
closure of the flowers.

It is so necessary to appreciate the important effects of the laws of
growth, that I will give some additional cases of another kind, namely of
differences in the same part or organ, due to differences in relative
position on the same plant. In the Spanish chestnut, and in certain fir-
trees, the angles of divergence of the leaves differ, according to Schacht,
in the nearly horizontal and in the upright branches. In the common rue
and some other plants, one flower, usually the central or terminal one,
opens first, and has five sepals and petals, and five divisions to the
ovarium; while all the other flowers on the plant are tetramerous. In the
British Adoxa the uppermost flower generally has two calyx-lobes with the
other organs tetramerous, while the surrounding flowers generally have
three calyx-lobes with the other organs pentamerous. In many Compositae